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Good morning All,

I have my end blocks and kerfed lining all glued in. Wanting to make my side braces now. How should these be mounted to the sides?
Reading a lot about how they should be inletted and not just glued between the kerfed lining as it can split the sides. Not really finding anything as what the inletting should be.


How should I proceed? Thank you!

I prefer the old cloth tape. You can do this a number of ways. I like to feather wood side support to meet into the sides of the kerfed lining. Inletting can also work but if not done clean you can make a stress riser for a crack to form. I also like when the are straight up the sides and the kerfing comes to them. Allow a small space to avoid shrinkage points.

I imagine inletting the side braces is intended to overlap the crossgrain strengthening. Butting the end of the sidebraces to the kerfing would interrupt that cross grain. I would inlet about 1/8”-3/16”. That way you would be sure to span the individual grains of the side. I actually did not inlet my side braces on my build. I guess I saw several examples where the side braces were butted and figured that was ok. I guess I will see how big a liability it will be. Perhaps other forum members will know more about all this, especially those who have extensive repair experience.

as a repair guitar ( 25 yr ext ) that is why I went back to the ribbon on my builds. the side supports are there to help when you bump the guitar from splitting. To be honest anything works. I have also heard that it ties the top to the back to this I don't believe that too much as the key is how the top works and creates the air pressure. Think of it this way you are making a drum in a way.
I have seen many guitar with side cracks. My observation is this. Wood locks cross grain movement. Tape allows that movement. Also tape weights a lot less.

I use brown ribbon, glued.

Thank you all for your replies. I haven't decided yet which way to go. I was really wanting to contrast against the dark rosewood just like when you look at the inside bottom thru the sound hole.

I looked in my HD 28 last night. It uses rosewood, about the same width and thickness one of a popsicle stick.

I will look and see what a piece of natural ribbon looks like.

Thanks again!

I use this electric harness tape which was posted here in the forum when I first started. I’ve done 23 builds with the 5 pack and going. Looks nice and old fashioned in the body.

https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B07 ... _424932990

I like the looks of your tape jread. I have a roll coming to see what it looks like.

I found the nicest grained straight, craft stick and shaped it up to see if I liked the looks of that. Here is it.

Diane Kauffmds wrote: ↑Sun Nov 27, 2022 9:58 pm I use brown ribbon, glued.

I'm not sure what you mean by "brown ribbon," Diane. There's no mention of it in the LMI or Stew-Mac catalogs. Is it some sort of craft Item?

I've used strips of linen, glued on with hide glue or fish glue, as side reinforcement. I've also used "popsicle stick" slats. I suppose there's some logic to the idea of "inletting" the reinforcements into the kerfing, but I don't think I've heard of any actual failures when things aren't done that way. Then again, I'm not a regular visitor to the ASIA or MIMF forums.

Yes. I use brown grosgrain ribbon, a cloth ribbon used in sewing. Sorry, I should have elaborated. I dip the strips in hide glue, use wet fingers to get off the excess; tweezers easily places it.

The struts are to mitigate side cracking, should a crack get started. That's the reason for their existence.

Creative Ideas 50-Yard Solid Grosgrain Ribbon, 5/8-Inch, Brown https://a.co/d/1rN3WxY